


the epitaph of an old record player

by celestialfics



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-15 17:01:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18673816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celestialfics/pseuds/celestialfics
Summary: Peggy, intelligent and adaptable as ever, takes the entirety of his story and mulls over it in her head for a time, sitting across from Steve and studying his face. Her eyes are set, eyebrows furrowed, chin sitting in her hands.After a long while, she speaks.“Go home, Steve,” she says, voice sure; she’s determined as she’s always been.





	the epitaph of an old record player

**Author's Note:**

> i havent written in 4 months,. of course this would bring me to write again. of course  
> this isn't perfect. this isn't exactly what i wish would have happened. but it helped me feel better, so maybe you can enjoy it amidst your binge of fix-its which i know i've been having... 
> 
> ur telling me that peggy would let steve get away with this absolute clownery? this tomfoolery? i do not think so.

The idea’s a blip in the radar at first, just a passing thought, a  _what if?_

He’s in Peggy’s office, and she’s on the other side of a glass window, and the thought runs through his head.  _What if I stayed?_ He stares for a moment, his mouth feeling dry. It’s unrealistic, he knows. Especially now, when he has a job to do, a team counting on him, a world to save. A whole damn  _universe_ to save.

But he looks for a moment longer and he yearns before he gets his shit together, takes a deep breath, and walks out of the office.

—

It tugs at him later. The stones weigh heavier than they should in a metal suitcase, and the handle of a legendary hammer sits lighter than it should in the palm of his hand. Sam, Bucky, and Bruce all look at him with different eyes. Some exude trust and respect, others bleed quiet and dejected acceptance.

Steve is aware that Bucky knows exactly what he’s considering. Of course he does, and of course he looks at Steve with that gaze full of strange, crestfallen understanding. “I’m gonna miss you,” he says, and Steve replies, “It’s gonna be okay.”

In the moment, he doesn’t know whether he’s saying that to himself or to Bucky, because the truth of the matter is that Steve questions whether anything has truly ever been okay. This—hardly a private moment, nor a particularly meaningful one—is all he and Bucky get, after everything, and it sure as hell doesn’t  _feel_ okay. He looks at Bucky’s face, and Bucky nudges him towards the platform, sad eyes and all.

 _It’s gonna be okay_ , Steve repeats to himself, letting out a breath.

The thought of a different life won’t leave. It lingers, an itch in the back of his brain. This is a chance for a life that he missed, a chance for him to shape something impossible into reality. After all the stones are in place, everyone—with the exception of Bucky, who’s always known Steve a little better than he’s known himself—is trusting Steve to come back. And he will, he’ll come back. But will he come back having lived another life?

It’s strange to feel selfish. And it’s what Steve feels as soon as the last stone is back in its exact slice of time, because time itself is in his hands and there’s a dance waiting, sitting patiently in history for him, right inside his grasp…

—

At first, Peggy doesn’t ask questions. She takes Steve into her arms gratefully, and they sway for a moment in the threshold of her apartment. The record player blares a tune Steve’s heard time and time again, and Peggy leads him into the living room, where they dance properly—or as properly as they can, because over the years Steve never thought to touch up on the rules.

It’s a peaceful moment, a gentle sway this way and that. But damn if Peggy Carter will accept a miracle without explanation, as after they part, she gently presses her hands to Steve’s chest and nudges him slightly away.

“You aren’t the Steve I know,” she says, a hand drifting up to touch Steve’s face. Her thumb traces the lines of a face that’s aged beyond her years. “You have to tell me how you’re here.”

And so Steve does; he tells it all, from the ice to the stones, from friends to enemies to friends, from death and into life again. He tells her about Bucky and Sam, about Tony and Nat, about the Avengers and space and the impossible that becomes possible. The time travel is hardest to explain, as he’s still wrapping his head around the whole thing, but he knows he’s created an alternate timeline just from showing up here, from fulfilling his selfish impulse and keeping an old promise.

Whatever he does here can’t impact where he came from—can’t change the life Peggy has already lived. He’s grateful for as much, because Peggy found her own happiness without Steve, and who’s he to take that from her? But in another time, in this alternate reality, he thinks an impulsive thought: he and Peggy deserve a chance at what they missed, don’t they?

Peggy, intelligent and adaptable as ever, takes the entirety of this and mulls over it in her head for a time, sitting across from Steve and studying his face. Her eyes are set, eyebrows furrowed, chin sitting in her hands.

After a long while, she speaks.

“Go home, Steve,” she says, voice sure; she’s determined as she’s always been.

Steve blinks at her.

“You have to realize,” she continues, swallowing thickly, “that you belong to a family now, to a new home. You don’t belong here, and I think you know that.”

“Peggy—”

“I love you, Steve. Part of me always will, in every timeline. There may be one out there where it turns out right for us, but—” She pauses, letting out a rattling breath. “You have to see that this isn’t right.”

She looks at him, her eyes welling with tears as his do the same, and she clasps his hands in her own. “Think about what you’re leaving behind, Steve.”

“I’ve left you—”

“You didn’t leave me,” Peggy says. “You lost me, and I lost you. We don’t usually get back what we’ve lost, now, do we? But you already have once, Steve. Not only your own life, but…”

A train, wind that’s colder than hell is hot, a hand reaching and reaching, but not close enough—the scene transforms into warm blue eyes that carry a deep sadness, a dark history and a bright future. Steve’s heart hammers in his chest.

“You can’t take that for granted,” Peggy insists, squeezing Steve’s hands.

He knows she’s right. He knows, and he knows now what he’s always known, that he’d never be able to stay here. As much as he’s longed for it in his life, it’s—it’s not right. He can’t leave everyone behind. He can’t live seventy years without his family, and of course it would take Peggy to make him truly realize that.

“I love you, Peg,” he says, his voice cracking in a wet, ugly way. “I just thought… God, I’ve missed you so much.”

Peggy smiles, and her reassurance is sad in a way that’s different from Bucky’s understanding because, when it comes down to it, Peggy knows that she’s worth it. All of it. She knows, and she refuses to let that be. Bucky—despite being just as absolutely worth it as Peggy is—doesn’t see himself the same. Peggy lets Steve go because she has to, it’s what’s right. Bucky lets Steve go not because he should, but because he thinks he’s not enough to hold onto.

It’s heart shattering when Steve realizes that he almost proved that to him.

—

“ —Five.”

Steve’s disoriented for a moment, standing on the platform. When he straightens, it’s with a new shield strapped to his arm—a quick trip to the Arctic in an already diverged timeline never hurt anybody, did it?

The relief radiating off Sam, Bucky, and Bruce can be felt in the atmosphere, and it’s insurmountable. Sam and Bucky rush the platform, tackling Steve into a messy, desperate embrace.

The mission is accomplished, really and truly. Steve lets out a sigh of relief, and a tension in his chest melts as the arms thrown around him grasp tighter.

When they pull away, all Steve can think to do is to pull the shield off his arm and press it into Sam’s hands. “It’s yours,” Steve says, watching as Sam stares at the shield with wide eyes. “Go ahead, put it on.”

Sam glances over to Bucky, who nods at Sam before looking back to Steve, casting him a smile. The relief still comes off of him in waves.

“How’s it feel?”

“Like it’s somebody else’s.”

Steve smiles, then, lifting an arm to set his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “It’s not, it’s yours. I’m technically over a hundred years old, you know. Everyone’s gotta rest some day.”

Sam lets out a breathy laugh at that, but Steve can tell he understands the deeper meaning. “I’ll do my best,” Sam promises, holding the shield up to his chest.

It’s another few moments with Bruce and Sam before Steve takes Bucky by the crook of his arm and leads him a few paces away from the others.

Bucky speaks first, “I thought you…” he trails, uncertain of the words.

“I know,” Steve replies, “I know you did. And I won’t lie and say I didn’t—I… I saw her.”

Bucky bites at his inner cheek. His hands are nestled again in his sweatshirt pockets. “And you didn’t stay?”

Steve smiles, lets out a long breath, and then says, “Well, she’s always been quite a bit smarter than me, you know.”

Bucky lets out an amused huff, his face tilted to the ground before he meets eyes with Steve again. Steve looks—he really looks into Bucky’s eyes, the depths of them, all the things they’ve seen and all the troubles it’s taken to get to this moment, right here. He thinks of all the things Bucky has yet to achieve, all the life he has left to live, and for a moment Steve’s horrified that he almost forfeited his part in that life to come.

“I’m sorry,” Steve says before he really knows he’s saying it, and Bucky looks shocked for about a second before he settles into a familiar, understanding expression.

“You don’t need to apologize,” Bucky responds, sliding his hands out of his pockets to take Steve into another embrace. “I wouldn’t have blamed you if you stayed. After everything, you deserve—”

“I deserve exactly what I have,” Steve interrupts, standing back to take Bucky’s face in his hands. “It’s not the end of the line yet, Buck. It can’t be.”

Bucky smiles, soft and beautiful, and Steve traces his thumb over Bucky’s lower lip. And when they kiss, Steve feels everything piece together. 

**Author's Note:**

> find me on [twitter](http://twitter.com/liquidsaints) & [tumblr](http://hanasonq.tumblr.com/)
> 
> thanks for reading! <3


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